Facebook decided I was doing naughty stuff on my account and thus removed it for most of last week without notifying me or giving me an explanation why they removed and later restored it.
It started on Monday 19th of February 2018 when I receive a mail from KeyBase that they cannot access my Facebook verification post. That’s when I tried to log into Facebook and instead of my timeline, I was asked to upload a picture of myself as verification that I’m me. After that I was logged out because Facebook was reviewing my profile and somebody would be in touch with me.
When my wife logged into her account, there was no trace of my account. I was not tagged in any pictures anymore, my company page was nowhere to be found and most upsetting was that my wife’s profile now said “Married” instead of “Married to Ken Bonny”.
In an attempt to get in touch, I also send a tweet to the Facebook twitter account to ask why my profile is removed.
On Tuesday 20th of February 2018 I find a contact form on Facebook that does not require me to log in. Every other way of contact, eventually redirects to the Facebook Help Center. After I’ve sent a complaint through this channel, I don’t even get a notification mail that I logged a complaint.
Due to work and other things that require my attention, I forget about the issue for two days. When I go to check on my profile on Friday 23rd of February 2018, my profile is back like it was never deactivated. I’m tagged in all my previous posts, all my posts are back, my company page is available again and most importantly, my wife’s profile now correctly indicates that I’m married to her.
The most annoying thing of all, is that I haven’t heard from Facebook at all since my account disappeared at least until this blog post went online on Monday 26th of February 2018. I don’t know why they deleted my account and I have a feeling I’m never going to know.
This is the problem I’ve always had with Facebook, this is why I’ve never had a profile there before I started my company. I understand Facebook is a widely used platform and it’s easy to find people. That’s why I made the account. But I don’t trust them like I do Google or Microsoft. I’ve never had one of those accounts removed or suspended. I trust them not to do so without contacting me and giving me a reason. Even if it’s just an automated mail to another account explaining generally why my account is suspended.
